tales of two writers

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About Andrea: Andrea Heiberg was accidentally born a few yards from Karen Blixen’s home in Denmark on Hemmingway’s birthday in 1955. When she was young she liked to imitate Karen Blixen because of her resemblance to the writer. Her love of theatre, comedia dell’arte, funny masks, and make-up prompted her to become a theatre make-up artist. She was a fan of the Italian playwright and performer Dario Fo who visited Denmark back then.

In 1979 Heiberg graduated as a teacher and settled down. She hadn’t fancied writing that much because she enjoyed reading, but she began writing plays for her school and found the process intriguing. Her school plays featuring her drama class ended up airing on Danish television twice, back when there was only one channel in Denmark. It was hard work, and she didn’t get paid extra, so she continued writing shorter plays, this time for a local amateur theatre.

In 1986 Heiberg won first prize (among 72 competitors) with a play for a theatre in Copenhagen. She wrote three Danish plays altogether that year, and one play, Kulsoen, is still available for sale in Denmark. After that, she didn’t write anything until 1992 when she won second prize with a short story.

In 2006 and 2007 Heiberg wrote a book manuscript about walking the Camino in Spain and she wrote in English though Danish is her native language. She continued to write short stories and a poem now and then also in English.

In 2008 after almost 30 years of teaching Heiberg moved to Sejer Island and this place inspired her to write several more short stories.

Coincidence or not, for a writer born near Blixen, sharing the same birthday as Hemingway, Heiberg’s writing is influenced by her two favourite authors—namely Blixen’s storytelling, her flow, her competence of picking stories people care to read, and Hemmingway’s strength in dialogue, and his limited use of adjectives.

About ina:

Ina Roy (Ina Roy-Faderman) was born in Lincoln, Nebraska to South Asian parents, an incongruity which explains most of her subsequent behavior. While a student at Stanford University, she studied creative writing through the English Department while completing her M.D. , and then went on to complete a Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of California-Berkeley. Somewhere between the endless cups of coffee, she published fiction in venues including Long Shot Magazine, India Currents, and The Silver Web. You can find a list of recent and upcoming publications on our “Our Work” page and by following her on Twitter (at ina fell to earth -all one word). She currently lives in the San Francisco Bay Area, where she cares for her family, grumbles about traffic, shoos various animals off her feet or keyboard, and teaches for the Philosophy Department at Oregon State University. She’s planning on getting some sleep real soon now.

Andrea and Ina, I’m so happy for you both. You’ve begun something here that will at least two things; keep you constantly thinking of new aspects, subjects and topics; and wondering how you can promote and grow more effectively so that you reach all of those readers you want to reach.

Me? I leave all that to Meena Rose. She’s brilliant at it. I write where she tells me. It saves me tons of frustration and worry. LOL.

Have a great time. You’ve gotten a great start already. We’ll all be cheering you on.

I am in awe of all the conjoined twins that are being birthed amongst the poetic community. I must have been on automatic pilot of late too as I barely registered that claudsy and meena had something going (I had an inkling but nothing concrete – will be checking them out next!)

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Thanks so much for getting in touch! We’re slowly getting back to blogging (both Andrea and I have had to take hiatuses for a variety of reasons) and are really looking forward to reconnecting with everyone. I love the poems you’ve been posting this month – so glad to see your work!